Mother Jones
By Stephanie Mencimer
July 28, 2023
From the water, the White River canyon was a scene worthy of Ansel Adams. Swallows darted in and out of mud houses packed on the underside of the soaring sandstone cliffs. A lone elk wandered the hillside, while sheep noshed along the water, tended by a man on a horse striking an iconic Western pose up on the ridge. But then, as we drifted peacefully around a bend, the stench of oil and other volatile organic compounds engulfed our little flotilla of rubber rafts in an invisible cloud of toxic gasses, blotting out the scent of sagebrush that had followed us down the river for the past two days. Eventually, the reason for the headache-inducing fumes came into view, and it wasn’t the sheep.